Los Angeles County Schools

A roiling dispute that involves allegations both of racial animus and the potential mishandling of millions of dollars of school funds seems likely to cost the job of a seasoned corporate manager hired by the Los Angeles schools seven months ago to fix its troubled accounting controls. School officials said Wednesday they are recommending the termination of Wajeeh Ersheid, the district's internal auditing director.

The parents filed into the cramped auditorium of a Bell Gardens elementary school--towing their fidgety children and brimming with angry explanations about why the youngsters had missed more than 15 days of school last year. But the group wasn't facing a truant officer or the school principal. The 50 or so adults were confronted with Deputy Dist. Atty.

After a summer of sometimes backbreaking work to improve Millikan Middle School, a group of student laborers was looking only for cold sodas and good food Thursday. So they had a barbecue to help celebrate their work as part of the school's Summer Youth Employment Training Program. It was a welcome break from their days pouring concrete to make benches, a fish pond and a grill.

Four fathers on a fund-raising hike for their children's school successfully reached the top of Mt. Whitney but took a day longer than planned to complete the arduous journey, one of the climbers said Wednesday. The group started its ascent of the 14,495-foot peak Sunday morning, camped for the night at 11,000 feet, and intended to reach the summit by midday Monday and descend by that night, said Danny Hill.

Rank: 1. Name: Mike Seidman School: Westlake Ht.: 6-5 Wt.: 235 Year: Sr. An unstoppable offensive weapon * Rank: 2. Name: Jacob Rogers School: Oxnard Ht.: 6-6 Wt.: 240 Year: Sr. Likes to hit linebackers * Rank: 3. Name: Alex Holmes School: Harvard-Westlake Ht.: 6-4 Wt.: 300 Year: Jr. Built like a lineman, runs like a fullback * Rank: 4. Name: George Wrighster School: Sylmar Ht.: 6-4 Wt.: 225 Year: Sr. Best in the City Section * Rank: 5. Name: Nick Longshore School: Canyon Ht.: 6-5 Wt.

A state audit committee assailed the state Department of Education on Thursday for approving the purchase of at least nine Los Angeles school sites despite suspicions that the soil on the properties was polluted by industrial chemicals.

A group of Washington Preparatory High School students reacted in typical teenage fashion Wednesday when asked if they would be willing to add a rigorous sixth day of school to their weekly schedule. A hush fell over the school library where dozens of students had gathered to attend the announcement of the opening of the new Maxine Waters Saturday Academy for Student Advancement in Math, Science and Communication at the high school campus in South-Central Los Angeles.

Several campuses were among schools in the state most heavily exposed to industrial air pollutants, according to a study released Tuesday by the Environmental Working Group. The nonprofit organization's report, titled "School Haze," found that nine Torrance schools were among the state's 25 campuses most exposed to combined amounts of carcinogens, reproductive toxins and airborne heavy metals emitted within one mile in 1995.

When someone set fire to Brenda Johnson's Volkswagen Beetle, she took it as a sign she was doing something right. Johnson assumed that the 1996 arson was just one more price to pay for her crusade to improve the beleaguered schools of Bassett, a poor, unincorporated community about 20 miles east of Los Angeles.

Speaking softly into a microphone and wearing a long, flowing, pale blue dress, Alice Lo began a slow, stately demonstration of a traditional Chinese dance Wednesday for students at St. Mel Catholic School. But soon the show took off in another direction as Lo found her voice with each new character, and each new costume change brought more enthusiasm from the children.